Beware of thieves wearing white collars

Today I came across an interesting interview with Frank Abagnale of "Catch me if you can" fame. I've previously got upset about the amount of money corporate America funnels into offshore tax havens each year. I've also got upset about the amount of money that gets laundered through off-shore havens for other purposes. But Mr Abagnale now points out quite rightly that its incredible that no one is getting upset about the staggering amount of money, estimated at $600 billion, being pissed away each year due to white collar crime. That makes Bush's $200 billion to finished Daddy's war look like small potatoes.

Admitedly some of the $600 billion eventually filters back into the economy via the black market. But some of it, too much probably, filters up and out of the food chain into white collar tax havens and cash mountains. As another article by Clifton Leaf seems to indicate, huge amounts of this bleeding of our wealth occurs due to large scale corporate fraud. We've all seen the tips of the white collar crime icebergs in the last couple of years - icebergs called Enron, Global Crossing, and Tyco to name a few but by all accounts the vast majority of white collar crime remains beneath the surface, either undiscovered, unreported, or unprosecuted.

And by all accounts white collar crime pays if you can get away with it. According to Abagnale and Leaf if you do the white collar crime, the odds of being investigated, prosecuted or incarcerated are much much lower than virtually any other crime. The advice of the infamous Abagnale that is supposed to make us feel better? Ignore worthless identity theft insurance, buy a good cross-shredder and check your credit reports as often as possible.